Languages and Cultures: Learning and Teaching Betwixt Worlds

Abstract

Modern nations like Aotearoa-New Zealand have a history of subjecting indigenous and minority peoples to education experiences that abandon us, destroy our languages and cultures, and actively strive to assimilate us. Throughout the world, greater than ever numbers of indigenous communities are establishing their own educational structures and systems that are better suited to their linguistic. cultural, educational and economic development and advancement. The hard work by parents, teachers, researchers and like-minded colleagues are having significant impacts on collective change for the betterment of indigenous and minority peoples. I shall focus this paper, then, on the complex relationships confronted by indigenous Maori people teaching and learning betwixt worlds, that is to say the relations between Māori, Pasifika and New Zealand European Pālangi in the university. The focus is on beings in relationships or the relations between the languages, beliefs and practices of the diverse groups of people.